Don't Get Hooked: Blue-bugging

The more we use our smart phones and the more information we store on them, the more hackers want to get access.

If you pair your phone with your vehicle's audio system, the Better Business Bureau has a word of warning for you.

It's called Blue-bugging. While it may sound harmless, Blue-bugging is an attack on your smart phone.

The Arkansas Better Business Bureau has some simple steps that will help make sure that you"Don't get Hooked."

Smart phones are awesome.

They can obey voice commands, direct you to a specific address, identify a song in seconds, and allow for instant Internet searches.

They also store a lot of personal data, personal contacts, photos, and video.

In other wordslots of stuff scam artists covet.

When you pair your smart phone with your vehicle's audio system and leave that connection open, you may become the target of Blue-bugging.

"They have paired their car and they leave their Bluetooth pairing open and then they get out of the carthey come out of the car and go to a store or something like that and the Bluetooth capability is still on," explains Mike Rohrer with the Arkansas Better Business Bureau.

The BBB advises you switch your Bluetooth into "Not discoverable" mode when you aren't using itespecially in crowded, public places.

Always use at least eight characters in your pin.

When pairing devices for the first time, do it at home or in the office.

And download the latest security updates.

These steps will help keep you from getting hooked.

"They'll either rack up charges to a fake account while they're getting paid per-minute charges by phone call or they're going to make phone calls to all over the world based, er, from your phone," says Rohrer.

Blue-bugging was developed in 2004 so it's not newbut calls about it made to BBBs across the country are on the rise, so beware.